Sacrifice
by VoicesOffCamera
Summary: When one of their own is taken in the middle of a mission gone bad, the team must race against the clock to find their missing teammate before it's too late. They are tested in a ways they had never been before and forced to ask themselves what exactly is worth sacrificing and how far they are willing to go in order to make it home alive.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:** Hello Young Justice fandom! *waves* Well, this is my first submission in this category. This story was originally written for Black Friar and ARL15's Young Justice competition, but due to time constraints and my own procrastination issues, I'm considering that entry to be a first draft. If you read the one that's posted on the competition site, this first chapter is mostly the same as what's there, but the next chapter is going to change quite a bit and then the final chapter will also be very different (I submitted the story originally as a one shot, but now it's going to be a three shot).

Big shout out to Alexandria–likethecityinEgypt for helping me out with some medical information in order to make it more realistic in this version than it was in the original version. That will come into play in the next chapter.

Since this is my first attempt at a story in this fandom, if you have any constructive criticism with any of the characters and how I can make them better, it would be appreciated! Hope you like it!

Here goes nothing!

* * *

 **Sacrifice**

 **Chapter One**

It was supposed to be an easy mission.

But if they were all being honest with themselves, their missions were never was as simple as they were supposed to be.

They had been given the task of covertly infiltrating Lexcorp in order to hack into Lex Luthor's personal computer – his hard drive unable to be accessed anywhere other than from within his personal office – looking for evidence of illegal activity and any connection with the Cult of the Cobra. Lex was supposed to be on the other side of the world on a business trip, leaving his office in the care of his extensive security.

Not a problem for the Team though.

Artemis and M'Gann were on surveillance outside of the building, keeping watch and ready to storm in if backup was needed. Kaldur and Conner were in charge of getting in through security, quietly taking out guards in order to clear a path to the elevator. The office was on the top floor, so the security measures from the roof were much more extensive than on the ground floor. The plan was to bank on the human factor on the ground level and come up to the office from below.

From the lobby, Robin and Wally would climb up the elevator shaft to the top floor, sneaking through air vents in order to infiltrate Lex's private office. Wally would stand guard while Robin hacked his way into the computer system. They would have minutes before the silent alarm would alert security downstairs to the unknown and unauthorized presence in Lex's office. If Robin and Wally could not escape back through the air vents, their emergency exit would be to smash through one of the windows, where M'Gann would be waiting to levitate them out of harm's way.

They had carefully planned this mission, trying to take every precaution possible in order to make it go smoothly. So when things went terribly wrong, it was hard on all of them.

 _Robin, Kid Flash, you have incoming,_ Kaldur warned over the psychic link.

 _Almost done,_ Robin answered distractedly as he worked.

 _Luthor's security team has been enhanced somehow,_ Kaldur responded. He sounded short of breath, which should have been an indication to both Robin and Wally to take what he was saying more seriously. _Do not engage. Get out before they get there._

 _How much time do you think we have?_ Wally asked from where he was keeping guard just outside of the office. But before he was even finished with the question, he could hear footsteps pounding up the stairs.

 _They got by me and are heading up the stairs,_ Conner interjected unnecessarily. _You got five minutes tops._

 _Sounds like less than that,_ Wally said as he shot away from the stairwell and back into the office where Robin was frantically working, slamming and locking the door behind him. _Rob, you almost done? We got company._

 _Two minutes,_ Robin said tensely.

 _We might not have two minutes,_ Wally said, sending a tense glance back toward the door. It was a little unnerving that security had gotten past the two hardest hitters on their team. Wally and Robin weren't supposed to see any action on this mission.

 _Almost there,_ Robin insisted.

 _I'm cut off,_ Conner said. _I can't make it up the stairs in time._

 _Miss Martian, be ready,_ Kaldur said tensely. _Kid Flash and Robin are going to need an emergency exit._

 _Two more minutes,_ Robin said again.

 _You said that at least a minute and a half ago,_ Wally pointed out, sending him an annoyed glance over his shoulder as he turned his body to more fully focus on the door.

 _Every time I almost work out the encryption, it rewrites itself,_ Robin said, frustration clear in his mental voice. _I just need to… almost… got it!_

The second that he said it, the door to Lex's office seemed to explode off its hinges, forcing both Wally and Robin to dive out of the way as the door flew across the room and bounced off the window on the other side. This should have caused the glass to shatter, but as the door fell away it revealed that the window was still completely intact.

 _Get out now!_ Kaldur yelled. It was a very rare occurrence when Kaldur lost his cool. _Do not engage!_

 _The window is bulletproof glass,_ Robin reported. He quickly whipped out smoke pellets from his belt, throwing them at the doorway. They exploded, impeding the advancement of the figures that had just appeared.

 _Artemis,_ Kaldur said curtly.

 _On it!_ Artemis answered.

A second later there was a distinctive _TWONK_ that came from behind the two young heroes. Instinctively, the two dove away from the window just in time as Artemis' explosive arrow detonated, sending debris ricocheting into the small office. For a moment everything was chaos. Then, the moment passed and an eerie quiet settled over the office.

 _Very subtle, Artemis,_ Wally said sarcastically as he stood up and dusted himself off.

 _Hey, you wanted an exit, you got one,_ Artemis snapped.

Robin laughed lightly as he too stood up, debris cascading off of his cape. _Messy, but_ _effective,_ he pointed out.

Just then, there was a low growl that came from the space where the door once was, the smoke clearing just enough that they could see three hulking figures crowding the doorway.

"What the…" Robin breathed, completely forgetting about the mental link for a moment as he stared.

"Dude, what _is_ that?" Wally whispered.

"No idea," Robin said quietly. "But I don't think we should hang around to find out." He glanced tensely back at the hole that was now in the window behind them. "Go."

As an ominous low rumble rolled out from within the smoke, Wally didn't need to be told twice. He shot toward the window.

 _You ready, M'Gann?_ Wally said as he approached the window.

 _Ready!_ M'Gann confirmed.

 _Comin' at you!_ Wally called as he flung himself out into empty air, trusting his life completely to his teammate. It took a frightening few seconds, but Wally finally felt the reassuring pull of M'Gann's telekinesis slowing his decent until he was floating on thin air. He glanced back up at the building, expecting Robin to be right behind him. But his teammate did not appear. _Robin! C'mon!_

 _USB was still in the computer,_ Robin said. _Just grabbing it. Coming out now!_

 _Regroup with M'Gann and Artemis on the rooftop,_ came Kaldur's order.

Wally felt the pull of M'Gann's telekinesis as he began floating upwards. He was about even with the window he had flung himself out of, moving up and away as he headed for the roof where they had started from at the beginning of this mission. He glanced back at the building, having the perfect vantage point to see Robin sprinting toward the hole in the window of Lexcorp.

He almost made it. Had he been two more steps ahead, he would have been in the clear. One foot was on the floor and the other was halfway through the opening, no time for any of his usual acrobatics as he ran full tilt toward the fifty story drop.

But in the split second before he cleared the building, something that looked startlingly like a giant tentacle shot out from the smoke that was now filling the office. Before Robin even had time to register his surprise, before he was even able to shift his expression, the appendage wrapped itself around his midsection and yanked him backwards, disappearing into the smoke that was still filling the office.

"Robin!" Wally shouted at the same time a shout of surprise tore over the mental link, cut short after just a second.

 _What happened?_ came Kaldur's tense voice.

 _It's got Robin!_ Wally said. _I gotta go back! M'Gann, send me back in!_

 _You are not going in alone,_ Kaldur said firmly. _We have to regroup._ _Superboy, how close are you to the roof?_

 _Three minutes._

 _Robin, can you hear me?_ M'Gann tried. There was a short pause. _He's no longer connected to the link._

 _What's that mean?_ Wally asked frantically.

At that point, he had just reached the roof where M'Gann and Artemis had been perched. Artemis was still at the edge of the roof, an arrow nocked on her bow, though rather than holding it up and taut, it was hanging lose in front of her as her eyes searched the building across the street. M'Gann was standing a few steps back, her hands to her temples as she concentrated on levitating Wally until his feet finally hit solid ground again.

 _He was probably knocked unconscious,_ M'Gann said, sounding a bit unsteady.

 _We gotta get in there!_ Wally said.

There was a noise on the other side of the roof, and all three turned in time to see Conner vaulting up onto the roof, clearly having just come from the fire escape at the back of the building. He looked disheveled from the fight, his hair a mess and his shirt and jeans torn.

"Aqualad's right behind me," he reported as he crossed the roof. "Can anyone see him?" It was clear he was referring to Robin as he looked across the street to Lexcorp.

"The office is still filled with smoke," Artemis said, returning her sharp gaze to the building. "What did you guys do, set the place on fire?"

Wally looked confused. "Robin just threw a couple of his smoke bombs to slow them down. It shoulda cleared out by now." He glanced over his shoulder. "Where the hell is Aqualad? We shouldn't be just standing around; we have to go back for him!"

"I am here," Kaldur said, launching himself onto the roof from the fire escape below in the same manner as Conner had just a minute before. He quickly crossed the roof. "Can anyone see Robin?"

"No," Wally said quickly, annoyed that they were rehashing a question they had just answered. "We need to get in there."

Kaldur nodded curtly. "M'gann, can you levitate three of us and yourself over there?"

M'Gann glanced across the street. "The opening is too small for all of us. But I can levitate one at a time."

"Artemis, you stay here as back up," Kaldur said. Artemis had the most effective long range attack. "M'Gann, levitate Conner first, then me, then Wally and then yourself. Let us go."

Without any more hesitation, the plan was carried out. Artemis covered them as they were levitated one by one across the street and into the now smoke filled office. They went in expecting an immediate attack, but the area was strangely quiet. Conner and Kaldur broke out more of the windows in order to clear out the smoke, revealing that the desk in the room had been knocked aside and was in fact in flames.

"That wasn't like that before," Wally said, looking at the scene wide eyed.

"Search the premises," Kaldur told him.

Wally didn't need to be told twice. He took off, pushing himself faster even though he could feel his endurance waning. He would need to eat something soon. There were fifty floors in the Lexcorp building. Wally searched every floor and returned to the top floor where the rest of the team was in five minutes.

"The building is completely empty," he reported flatly. Then, suddenly, he lashed out, punching a nearby wall. "Damnit! I shouldn't have left him. We shoulda gotten back in here sooner! Damnit, damnit, damnit!"

 _What's going on in there?_ Artemis demanded.

 _There are no signs of the security or of Robin,_ Kaldur reported dismally. _We will regroup at your position._

A few minutes later, they had gathered once again on the rooftop where they had started this mission.

"There's been no one in or out of the building since he got grabbed," Artemis insisted. "How could he not be in there?"

"I'm telling you, I searched every single floor!" Wally snapped.

"Well maybe you should search again," Artemis shot back.

"Kid Flash is right," M'Gann said dismally. "I couldn't sense Robin anywhere in that building."

"How did this get so out of hand?" Wally demanded loudly. "This was supposed to be an easy mission, just in and out."

"We were expecting human security," Kaldur said. "At first, that was what we found. But then, several of a clearly more advanced security team appeared, and they had inhuman abilities. They were mutated, some of them were even physically mutated with extra limbs. Superboy and I were outmatched."

"When I went to the stairwell to try and get up to you guys, I saw several come up from below, down where the basement was," Conner said. "There must have been some kind of secret entrance they were using down there. There's no way they were all there when we first got there. Somebody called them in when we started taking out the human security."

"So... what do we do now?" M'Gann said slowly. This was the first time they had lost a teammate in the middle of a mission like this.

"We have to go find him," Wally said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "We search the basement, there has to be some sort of passage down there they used to get out."

"Are you crazy?" Artemis shouted, throwing her hands up in the air. "Those things already kicked our butts once. We need to go to the League and at least get some back up."

"We go to the League and they're gonna completely take over," Conner said. "It'll be even more proof that we can't handle ourselves."

"But if we go after him and something goes wrong... it could cost Robin his _life_ ," M'Gann pointed out.

They all looked to Kaldur, who had been quietly watching the debate. He sighed.

"We should go back to Mount Justice and regroup," Kaldur said, though he still sounded torn and not completely sure of his decision. "We should to report what happened here to the Justice League."

"We go back to Mount Justice _without_ Robin, Batman is gonna have all of our heads mounted on the wall of the Batcave," Wally pointed out.

There was an uncomfortable pause as the others seemed to consider this. While Batman could often seem uncaring and aloof, he had made it clear on several occasions that he was very protective over his partner.

"You know… he's got a point," Artemis said slowly, obviously hating having to agree with the speedster.

"We did this, we should fix it," Conner added firmly, meeting Kaldur's gaze with a determined look.

"Think about what Robin would say if it were any of the rest of us," Wally pointed out. "He would say that we don't abandon our own. If it were _you_ that was taken, Kaldur, he would lead the charge to come after you."

Kaldur sighed in defeat. "Fine," he relented. "We will investigate the basement and see if we can find the passage they may have left from and any evidence to indicate where they were going. If we cannot find anything though, we must inform the Justice League."

"Well then, let's go!" Wally said impatiently.

Once they had a plan, there was no hesitating with putting it into action. The team climbed down the fire escaped and entered Lexcorp through the same back alley door they had broken into before. But this time, instead of focusing their efforts on moving up in the building, they shifted their efforts to finding a way down.

Conner led them to the stairwell he had found before and they headed down into the depths of the building, each member of the team on high alert, expecting trouble around every corner they turned.

But they found none.

They reached the basement to find that it was just as deserted as the rest of the building. This was far from a comforting find. Wally had searched this space during his initial run through of the building, but he hadn't paid much attention to the area after seeing that there was no one there. But upon closer inspection, M'Gann uncovered a secret passage in the floor, a panel that gave way to a staircase leading further under the building.

The Team descended down into what appeared to be a dry, abandoned sewer system that ran underneath Lexcorp. It was dark in the tunnel, but Kaldur was able to light the way with his glowing tattoos, shedding an eerie light over the area. For a while there was only one path to follow. But after hurrying along the passage, they soon found that it opened up into a system that was very much active. Not only that, but the passage suddenly branched out into almost half a dozen tunnels going in different dirctions.

"We will split up," Kaldur said decisively. "Kid Flash and Superboy, start at that end. Artemis, Miss Martian and I will start at this end. Stay within range of the mental link and stay together."

"We're not going to be able to see anything without your light," Wally pointed out.

Artemis reached back into a pouch on the side of her quiver. "I think I have one of Robin's glow sticks," she said, the implication that Robin was usually the one that was prepared hanging in the air. "Here." She handed the glowing green stick to Wally, who immediately took off, followed closely by Conner.

Wally and Conner covered the most ground, finishing their sweep of their third tunnel while Kaldur, M'Gann and Artemis were finishing their second. They were all showing signs of tiring at this point; they had been searching for almost two hours without any kind of break.

"One tunnel left," Artemis pointed out dismally.

"We will search it together," Kaldur said, exhaustion clear in his tone. "If we do not find anything, we will take the Bioship back to Mount Justice and inform the League of what has happened."

No one said it outright, but it was clear that hope was waning thin in each of their faces. Even so, they hurried through the tunnel, Wally pulling a bit ahead and Artemis – currently the only one without superpowers in the group – impressively keeping up at the back of the group. But as they searched, they found this tunnel was the same as they last five. Long, winding and frustratingly empty of life save for the odd rat running around.

"Dead end," Wally said flatly as he reached the end of the tunnel, waiting for the others to catch up.

"We need to find a way up to the surface," Kaldur said, clearly not wanting to waste any more time. Robin had been missing for over two hours now, and he was second guessing his decision not to go to the Justice League right away. "M'Gann, can you -"

"Wait," M'Gann interrupted. Her eyes were closed and her hands went to her temples as she concentrated.

"What is it?" Kaldur asked.

"I... I think..." M'Gann mumbled. "I think I sense something."

"Is it Robin?" Wally asked, a small note of hope betrayed in his voice.

"It's hard to tell," M'Gann admitted. "It's weak and it keeps on fading away. But it does feel familiar."

Conner was looking around the small space. "But this is just another dead end," he pointed out.

"Maybe not," Artemis said thoughtfully.

She reached into her quiver and drew one of her arrows. It was one of the real arrows with a sharp metal tip. She moved to one wall and began tapping the walls with the tip of the arrow. It made a dull _clink_ noise of metal on concrete. She walked along the wall, dragging and tapping her arrow and listening to the noise. She moved along the three walls, occasionally tapping on the ground as well. Then, she reached up with her arrow and tapped along the ceiling. After just a minute there was a sharp _ting_ of metal on metal.

"There," Artemis said. "There's some kind of metal panel here. It could be another passage."

Conner stepped up, looking up at the ceiling that hung just out of reach. "Can someone give me a lift?"

M'Gann stepped forward and reached out a hand, carefully levitating Conner up into the air, letting him hover just a few feet off the ground so that he could reach the ceiling. Conner felt along the ceiling for a moment.

"There's definitely some kind of… metal panel or something," he reported. "But there's no obvious hatch or way to open it."

"I heard him!" M'Gann suddenly exclaimed, her eyes wide. In her surprised, she accidentally dropped Conner about a foot before she managed to catch him again.

"What?" several voices chorused at the same time.

M'Gann sucked in a breath and then looked up at the ceiling. "I heard him. He's up there."

"What did he say?" Wally asked quickly. "Is he alright?"

"I… I don't know," M'Gann said unsteadily. "It wasn't words really, just a rush of emotions." She stopped short of saying what kind of emotions she had felt – pain and also a hint of fear – not wanting to alarm the others. "But it was definitely him."

Conner needed no more information. He reached up, feeling one corner of the metal panel and pushed upwards. The metal corner folded up away from him, sending light cascading down into the dark tunnel. He paused, peaking through the gap he had made, looking for any signs of life or threat.

"What do you see?" Kaldur questioned quietly.

"It looks like a warehouse of some sort," Conner said lowly. He listened. "I don't see or hear anyone."

"Open it a little more, enough for M'Gann to slip through," Kaldur instructed.

Conner did as he was told and M'Gann went into camouflage mode and then levitated up into the warehouse.

 _It looks like the coast is clear,_ M'Gann reported through the mental link.

"Does this feel wrong to anyone else?" Artemis questioned as the team climbed up into the warehouse. They were in a big open room with a few boxes scattered around, but not a soul in sight.

Kaldur frowned, but turned around without answering. "Miss Martian, can you sense Robin?" he asked.

M'Gann closed her eyes as she concentrated. "Yes, but just barely." She paused and then looked up. "He's upstairs."

"Everyone, stay together and tread carefully," Kaldur warned. "There must be more to this than meets the eye."

It didn't take the team long to find a staircase that led up to the second level. From there, they traveled down a long, darkened hallway, farther into the bowels of this seemingly abandoned building. Along the way, they did not meet another living creature.

"He's just up ahead," M'Gann reported.

"Can you tell if anyone is with him?" Kaldur asked.

"It doesn't feel like there is," M'Gann said after a moment of concentration.

"This makes no sense," Artemis spoke up. "It's too easy. Why would they grab Robin, only to dump him in some random warehouse with no guards?" She glanced around. "This has to be some kind of trap."

"I fear that you may be right," Kaldur agreed reluctantly. "But we have not come this far to simply turn back. We will have to meet whatever challenge is presented to us."

There was a look of steely resolve in each of his teammate's eyes as they looked at him. no more discussion was needed. They would not leave any of their own behind.

They were going to see this through to the very end. One way or another.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note:** Thank you so much to everyone who took the time to review! I really appreciate it and I'm so glad you're liking it so far! To those who read the first version on the contest website, about halfway through this chapter is where this story begins to change. The originally solution that I had to their problem was actually not medically possible, so I had them come up with a new solution. Please let me know what you think!

* * *

 **Chapter Two**

The Team continued down the hallway in a tight formation, each on them on guard as they expected some kind of ambush with every step. As they reached the end of the hallway, they found a single metal door. At the questioning looks sent to her, M'Gann gave a curt nod to confirm that Robin was indeed behind that door. Wally was closest, so he reached out and tried the handle. It turned effortlessly… the room wasn't even locked. That was another red flag and everyone tensed as Wally pushed the door open.

It was not at all when any of them had expected to find.

While the rest of the warehouse had been dank, dark and practically falling apart, this room was clean and sleek. The walls were so white they seemed to glow and painfully bright fluorescent lighting lit the small room. It even had the sterile smell of an operating room, a stark contrast to the molded and rusted smell of the rest of the building. It took each of the team a moment to adjust to what they were looking at.

"Robin!" Wally shouted, turning to a blur as he shot into the room at top speed.

The rest were close behind, trickling into the room slowly, still weary of some kind of trap. Indeed, Robin was in the room, but the sight was a tough one to stomach.

He was up against the far wall, being held upright by some sort of machine. There was a large flat, metal circle behind him with a vertical metal piece that bisected the circle and ran between Robin's back and the wall behind him. His arms were pulled up at forty-five degree angles above his head, his wrists contained within two thick metal shackles that were attached to the top of the circle. His feet were together and similar metal shackles connected his ankles to the bottom of the circle, his feet hanging about six inches above the floor.

There was blood staining the side of his head, which hung limply on his shoulders. His cape, gloves, utility belt and shirt were all missing, though his domino mask was still thankfully in place, his identity still hidden. There was a strange device in front of his chest that sat at the top of a metal pedestal of sorts. The device was thick and round with a dull panel on the front of it, like what one would see on a digital clock that had been unplugged.

Strung up like that without his cape and shirt, it was suddenly painfully obvious that Robin was in fact the youngest member of their team by several years.

"Robin, can you hear me?" Wally asked, immediately at his friend's side.

"Can you get him down?" Kaldur asked, staring at the scene is front of him, his eyes wide with barely contained horror at what he was witnessing.

"I don't even know what this thing is," Wally said quizzically, looking the contraption up and down. "It's way too elaborate to just be restraints." He glanced back at the team. "Superboy, think you can break this thing apart?"

"It'd be my pleasure," Superboy said, crossing the room.

But just then, Robin began to stir. His eyes slowly blinked open and he groaned.

"Rob?" Wally questioned.

Robin made a pained noise in the back of his throat. "Get... out..." His voice was raspy and weak, but his message was clear.

Artemis, who had been the last one hovering in the doorway, stepped fully into the room in order to try to hear Robin better. The moment she did, there was a sudden deafening crash, shaking the entire room. They all whipped around to see that a panel had fallen from the ceiling, filling the doorway and blending it in with the rest of the stark white walls, trapping them in the room.

Superboy and Kaldur immediately rushed to the spot where the doorway had just been. But the others were drawn by the sudden sound of a loud and clear beeping noise that suddenly filled the room. They turned to find that the panel on the front of the circular device had lit up and was displaying the numbers 10:00 in bold red. It blinked one, twice, three times. Then it changed, showing 9:59. And a moment later it showed 9:58.

"It's counting down," Artemis said slowly.

"It's a bomb!" Wally exclaimed, taking an involuntary step backwards away from his friend.

"We can't get through," Conner shouted.

"The walls are lined with lead," Robin spoke up, his vision clearing as he seemed to become more aware of his surroundings. "There's -" He was cut off as he coughed. "There's a key inside the bomb. You gotta disable it to get it."

"I'm on it!" Wally said immediately, stepping back up. "Shouldn't be a problem, we got plenty of time..." But his voice trailed off as he got up close to the machine that held their teammate. He strained to get a good look at the back of the bomb, trying to see between the device and Robin.

Then he froze.

Wally's eyes were wide with shock and suddenly he was backing up. Robin was watching him with weary eyes, clearly not as surprised as the rest of the team by his reaction.

"What is it?" Kaldur asked.

"It… the bomb… it's _attached_ to him," Wally stuttered, looking vaguely sickened by the idea. "I've never seen anything like it, but the wires actually go _into_ his chest."

A heavy silence followed this revelation as the young heroes struggled to absorb this.

"Can we at least… get him down?" M'Gann said timidly, looking up at his restraints.

"Any movement, risks setting off the bomb," Wally said, approaching the device again, his eyes desperately searching the contraption. "There has to be a way to deactivate it."

"The bomb…" Robin took a deep breath and grimaced as if in pain. "The bomb is connected to my heart." He turned his head slightly, avoiding looking directly at them. "It'll only deactivate if my heart stops."

There was a ringing silence once more in the room. No one moved. No one spoke. It was as if time had simply stopped, even though it was painfully clear that was untrue as they all watched the countdown clock steadily ticking down the time they had left.

 _8:12… 8:11… 8:10… 8:09…_

"So, what're our options?" Wally finally demanded, looking around at the rest of them.

"I know one," Robin spoke up, his voice hoarse as a strangely morbid smirk crossed his lips.

Wally glared at him. "I am deliberately _not_ asking for your opinion."

"There are not many options available within the allotted time," Kaldursaid flatly as he eyed the countdown on the bomb.

 _7:55… 7:54… 7:53…_

"What if we just rip it off of him?" Artemis said. "It won't detect his heartbeat anymore and it'll stop the countdown."

"Negative," Wally said, stepping closer and getting a better look at the small space between the bomb and Robin. "It's too well integrated into him. Ripping it out like that will cause too much damage; he'll bleed out before we can get him out of here."

"Can you remove it more carefully?" Kaldurquestioned. "A way that will cause less damage?"

"Sure I could," Wally said. Then he eyed the countdown, frowning. _7:21… 7:20…_ "You know, if I had more time that is. With the bomb live, one wrong wire disconnected and it's gonna detonate."

"I could crush it," Conner volunteered.

"If you crush it without disarming it, I'm willing to bet my life that there's a failsafe that will switch on and it'll trigger," Wally said, shaking his head firmly.

"Well, we gotta do _something_ , or we're all gonna be dead," Artemis snapped, a note of panic just barely detectable in her tone.

 _6:59… 6:58…_

"Not necessarily," Robin spoke up. He suddenly sounded breathless. Clearly this machine was putting some kind of strain on his body. "SB and Aqualad will be able to withstand the strength of the blast. They could protect the rest of you."

But Wally was already shaking his head even before he finished speaking. "Superboy and Aqualad _might_ be able to withstand the force of this blast, but the rest of us won't this close to the detonation. Even if they try to shield us, we're still gonna get fried. Not to mention, that plan leaves the small problem of _you_ getting the full force of the explosion."

"We don't have time to argue about this!" Conner suddenly spoke up. "We have to do something now!"

 _6:27… 6:26… 6:25… 6:24…_

"What if we…. What if we stop his heart," M'Gann suddenly spoke up quietly.

They all turned to look at her with varying degrees of disbelief in their features.

"What are you crazy?" Wally demanded loudly. "You _wanna_ kill him?"

"Sacrifice for the greater good," Robin murmured, almost as if he were talking to himself.

Wally whirled on him, anger radiating off of him. "No! This is your _life_ we're talking about, Rob! You don't get to sacrifice that for us!"

"We don't have a lot of options here," Artemis pointed out quietly, a surprising amount of sympathy in her voice.

"We just have to stop his heart long enough to stop the bomb," M'Gann insisted desperately, clearly distraught that her suggestion had been taken the wrong way. "Then, after we disable the bomb, we start it back up again."

Kaldurturned to Wally, a calculating look in his eyes. "If we stop his heart, how long would we have to restart it?"

"It generally takes four to six minutes for brain cells to begin to die with no blood flow," Wally said, though he was clearly not happy with the way this conversation was going. He glanced up at Robin critically. "Possibly less time for him because he's small for his age."

"Hey," Robin said, one corner of his mouth twitching upward. "I take offense to that."

"His head wound is also a wild card," Wally went on as if he hadn't spoken, speaking quickly as his eyes went up to study the blood that stained the side of Robin's head. "If he has a bad concussion and he passes out, there's a chance he might not wake up again. And there's no way to know the extent of the concussion without medical equipment." He paused. "Then there's the chance that even if we do get his heart started up again, the timer might pick up right where it left off." He shook his head, frowning. "The whole thing is a big gamble."

"It's a gamble you guys have to take," Robin spoke up determinedly.

 _5:03… 5:02…_

"Even if we did _have_ to take that gamble, how do you propose we do that?" Wally demanded, glaring up at his friend before glancing around at the others. The room went quiet. No one wanted to answer that question. Wally sighed and then went on, speaking quickly. "Let me speed this up then. Suffocation isn't gonna work because that in itself will take at least three minutes and then there won't be enough time left to revive him before he starts losing brain function. We can't electrocute him without risking major damage to his heart. And we have nothing else to work with. There are _no_ good options there."

"I'm hearing a lot of what we _can't_ do, so why don't we talk about what we _can_ do," Artemis pointed out. "We're running out of time!"

 _4:32…_

"Is there some way to bypass the sensor?" Kaldur asked. He looked up at Robin when he posed the question, seeing as he was their best hacker despite his current predicament. "Some way to make it think that your heart has stopped even if it has not?"

"We can try," Robin said slowly, sounding a bit reluctant. "I won't know for sure unless I get a look at the inside of this thing. But that's using up time that you guys may not have."

"It is a risk that we are willing to take in order to get _all_ of us out of here in one piece," Kaldur said evenly.

There were nods of agreement throughout the room. None of them were willing to sacrifice a team member for their own safety. It was at that moment that it was realized that they were all going to make it out of this room together or they would face the consequences of this ticking time bomb as a team.

"Less than four minutes left," Conner pointed out tensely in an attempt to hurry this plan along.

 _3:45… 3:44…_

"Okay, so we gotta open this thing up, right?" Artemis said, determinedly walking forward and drawing an arrow from her quiver.

"Careful," Robin warned. "There could be a failsafe built in. Don't take it all the way apart; just enough to see if there are any wire that connect the two halves together."

"Gotcha," Artemis said as she used the tip of the arrow to carefully pry apart the bomb at the seam that ran around the edge of the device. With a click, the two pieces came apart, though she held them close together so that they didn't fall too far from each other, allowing her to check for the wire that Robin had described. "I don't see anything," she reported as she checked around the entire device.

"Pull it apart carefully," Wally said, reaching out to help.

Working together they pulled the bomb apart, exposing the wad of crisscrossing wires that were contained. Everyone held their breath, expecting some sort of failsafe. But the bomb continued counting down… a good sign at this point.

 _2:36… 2:35…_

"Can you pull it out any further without messing with any of the wires?" Robin asked, straining to try and get a look at the bomb from such a severe angle.

"Not much, it's still attached to this thing," Wally said, and then glanced up at Robin. "And you." But even as he said it, he was able to shift the front part of the device out a little farther.

Robin eyed the device critically for several seconds.

"Okay, if nothing else, it looks like we can disconnect the countdown, give us some more time," Robin said, sounding a bit surprised by this revelation. He took a deep breath. "See the four wires plugged into the side of the display?"

"Yeah," Wally confirmed.

"Find which one is connected to some sort of power source," Robin instructed. "If that's the only wire going into the power source, you _should_ be able to cut it without triggering a failsafe. The other three wires are probably decoys connected to a trigger or failsafe."

" _Should_? That sounds so reassuring," Wally said sarcastically as he tried to carefully sort out the mess of wires that filled the device. He swallowed then let out a frustrated sigh. "I can't tell left from right in this thing, there's too much going on."

"Take a deep breath, Kid," Kaldur instructed. "You can do this."

Several more long seconds passed by.

"Here, I think I found it!" Wally finally exclaimed. "Three of the wires go to the same place, but this one goes to a small cylinder that might be the power source. It's got no other wires going into it."

 _1:10… 1:09…_

"Just over a minute left," Kaldur reported tensely, checking the countdown. "Can you cut the wire without disturbing any of the others?"

"Artemis, I need the tip of one of your arrows," Wally said quickly.

"My hands are a little full here," Artemis snapped, glancing down at the half of the bomb she still held. "Superboy, grab the one off the floor and snap it."

Superboy quickly did as he was told, snapping the arrow close to the metal tip before handing it over to Wally.

"Forty-five seconds," Kaldur said.

"That's not helping!" Wally practically snarled in annoyance. "In any case, we're either gonna be safe or dead in ten." He took a deep breath. "Here goes nothing." And with that, he threaded the tip of the arrow into the device and with a flick of his wrist, cleanly cut through the wire.

 _0:32…_

For a moment, it seemed that nothing had changed. The electronic beeping noise that came from the bomb persisted.

"Well… we're not dead," Robin pointed out into the otherwise silent room.

Kaldur let out a sigh of relief as he looked at the display that had now gone dark again. "The countdown stopped."

"It's still monitoring his heartbeat though," Wally added. "That's what the beeping is."

"At least we have more time though," Artemis pointed out. "Think you get it off of him now?"

Wally looked him up and down. "Well, nothing else is attached to the power source." He leaned closer, getting a better look at the inside of the bomb. "I think… I think the rest of the bomb is being powered by his heartbeat." He paused, studying the device for a moment. "See these red wires? I don't think they're actually wires, I think they're tubes filled with Robin's blood. His heart is pumping his blood through the bomb, which the bomb is using to power itself. The idea is that once his heart stops, the blood stops and then the bomb will power off."

"Well, can't we just cut the tubes then?" Conner asked. "Then the blood will stop moving through it and it'll shut off."

"Too easy," Robin said.

"He's right," Wally agreed. "You cut those tubes, blood's gonna go everywhere and start frying all this circuitry. I'm willing to bet my life that that'll set off a failsafe and cause the bomb to detonate." He reached in and fingered one of the red wires. "This feels thick too. I bet there's sensors that will be able to tell if they are cut."

"Can we trick it?" Artemis asked. "Make it think that Robin's heart has stopped somehow?"

"Miss Martian," Robin suddenly spoke up. "Can you stop my blood before it goes into the tubes?"

M'Gann looked uncomfortable at this request. "I can try," she said. "But the human body is really complex and veins are very small. I… I might not be skilled enough for that kind of precision."

"And she can't just stop the blood in its tracks," Wally said. "That'll more or less be a blood clot, which could kill you." He looked over at the Martian. "You'll have to redirect the blood so that it keeps flowing through his veins."

M'Gann stepped closer and took a deep breath. "Okay," she said, sounding a bit steadier.

"There are four tubes going between his chest and the bomb," Wally said. "Two in and two out, I would guess. It's not draining his blood, just redirecting it through the bomb and then back into his body. You'll have to figure out which two are the 'out' tubes, don't mess with the ones sending blood back in. That'll simulate what would happen if his heart actually did stop."

M'Gann closed her eyes, concentrating. "Got it," she said quietly after a minute, able to feel the young hero's blood flow with her telekinesis. "Two out, just like you said." She looked up at Robin. "Ready?"

Robin nodded. "Do it."

M'Gann raised a hand as she focused her entire concentration on the blood running through Robin's veins. She reached forward with her telekinesis, but hesitated as Robin flinched and let out a small yelp at the sudden intrusion. M'Gann paused and then reached forward again, this time much more gently. It was such a small target that she was searching for, it made it very difficult to not disturb anything around the target.

She looked up and met Robin's eyes. It was an overwhelming feeling to have his life in her hands.

She swallowed and then refocused on the task at hand. She could feel the blood flowing through Robin's veins and could feel where the tubes entered those veins in order to disrupt that flow. As carefully as she could, M'Gann willed the blood to bypass the tubes and continue on their natural path through Robin's veins. It was a slow process, as she was afraid to go too quickly. Minutes ticked by and she was immensely grateful not to be doing this with the pressure of the countdown timer on the bomb hanging over her.

Finally, the red tubes were beginning to lighten as less blood flowed through them. Everyone was watching quietly and M'Gann tried her best to ignore all the eyes that were on her.

The beeping noise coming from the bomb was slowing down, clearing having sensed Robin's heartbeat through his blood flow, and not being able to sense it as well anymore. Encouraged by this, M'Gann pushed forward until she was directing all of Robin's blood passed the two tubes in his chest, putting up small barriers within him to keep the blood from leaving his body. It was extremely delicate work and once M'Gann found the right spot, she froze in place, closing her eyes.

"I… I got it," she whispered, afraid to move even a muscle.

There were several long seconds of silence in which they were able to confirm that the bomb was no longer beeping incessantly. It had been disable.

"Keep holding it," Wally said carefully. "I'm going to get these tubes out of him."

He stepped up to his friend and began carefully threading the tubes out of his chest. Robin gasped and grimaced at the strange sensation that this sent through him. There was no time for hesitation though; it was clear that M'Gann's concentration was waning. Working as quickly as he dared, Wally continued threading the tubes out of Robin's skin.

"Almost there," Wally said after several long, quiet minutes as he worked on the last one. "And… got it!" He straightened up and grinned before letting out a celebratory whoop of joy. "Take that, Mister Criminal Mastermind! Outsmarted!"

M'Gann released her hold, stumbling slightly only to be caught and steadied by Conner. Four lines of blood streaked down Robin's chest from where the tubes had been placed, but thankfully it wasn't at an alarming pace. Everyone was smiling, even Robin gave a tired smile, relief radiating around the room.

"We still need to get out of here," Kaldur pointed out. He moved forward. "We need to get the key out of the bomb and we need to get Robin down."

"That would be appreciated," Robin quipped, his voice strained. "My shoulders are killing me."

"Here," Artemis said, pulling the disabled bomb off of its perch and handing it over to Wally.

"I'll get him down," Conner said, striding forward after he was sure M'Gann could stand on her own.

"This still seems like an overly elaborate restraint system, doesn't it?" Artemis said, stepping closer to look at the restraints that still held Robin. "I mean, clearly he wasn't going anywhere with that bomb connected to him, right?"

"Maybe they just wanted to be really sure he wouldn't get out?" M'Gann suggested. "Or they didn't know which one of us they were going to capture?"

"Hm," Artemis hummed, clearly not convinced. She reached up one hand toward one of the shackles to brace herself as she leaned around to see the part of the machine that was hidden behind Robin.

"This wouldn't have held me," Conner pointed out, a slightly cocky note in his voice, as he approached the other side of the contraption and reached up for one of the shackles.

"Wait!" Artemis suddenly shouted whipping her head back around and starting to move away.

But it was too late.

Conner was already tearing the shackle off of Robin's left hand. There was the expected crunch of metal, but also a strange buzzing noise. Before any of them could react, there was suddenly a blinding light and several screams, both in surprise and in pain. Conner and Artemis were both thrown backwards with such force that they struck the opposite wall before collapsing to the ground.

"Artemis!" Wally shouted just as M'Gann yelled, "Superboy!"

"I'm fine, I'm fine," Conner said, brushing off M'Gann's attempts to help him to his feet. There was a strange buzzing noise in his ears, but ultimately it seemed he was unharmed by whatever had just happened.

"Artemis, your hand," Wally gasped, kneeling next to the archer.

"It's nothing, just a burn," Artemis said as she blinked rapidly, cupping her hand to her chest, her palm suddenly covered with angry, red blisters.

But as soon as she said it, realization seemed to dawn on the team. Conner and Artemis' sudden projectile across the room had distracted them. Now they turned back to where Robin was still trapped. His left arm hung limply at his side, his right still securely shackled to the wall. His head hung on his shoulders like dead weight and he was completely still

Wally rushed to Robin's side, reaching up to place two fingers on his neck, looking for a pulse. But even before he said anything, Conner knew what he would find. His super hearing told him the horrible truth in the silence that radiated from the young hero.

No air moved through his lungs.

No heart beat in his chest.

Even the blood in his veins was still.

He was dead.

"What happened?" Kaldur demanded as he quickly joined Wally.

"There was another failsafe," Artemis said. "An electrode that was up against his back. It must have triggered when the shackles were broken, electrocuting him. And anyone else who was touching the metal." She looked down at her own badly burned hand.

"There's no pulse." Wally's revelation echoed through the room as everyone else went silent.

"We need to get him down," Kaldur commanded loudly. "Superboy."

But Conner was frozen in place. He had done this. He had killed his teammate. He had killed Robin.

M'Gann flew forward when Conner didn't move. "What do we do?" she asked.

Kaldur reached behind Robin with one hand. "Break the other shackle with your telekinesis. I will absorb any electricity that is triggered."

M'Gann immediately did as she was told, pulling the remaining shackle apart with her telekinesis. There was a small discharge from the electrode, but it wasn't on the scale of the first one and Kaldur was easily able to absorb the charge.

"Get him down and lay him flat," Wally said in a surprisingly commanding tone. "We've got four to six minutes until brain cells to begin to die with no blood flow."

"His wrist," M'Gann said quietly. The wrist that had still been contained in metal during the initial shock had been badly burned, his skin not only an unnatural red, but the middle of the burn appeared sickening black.

"We'll deal with that later," Wally said. "Get him down."

Quickly repeating the process, M'Gann broke the shackles around his ankles – revealing similar burns – while Kaldur absorbed the excess electricity. Then, she levitated him down off of the wall and laid him out flat on the floor.

"Can we use Kaldur's electricity to shock him?" M'Gann asked quickly. "Like a defibrillator?"

"That only works on TV," Wally snapped uncharacteristically. He was already checking Robin's airway. "We have to do CPR first to get his heart moving. Then we can use Kaldur's electricity to jump start it."

Artemis had joined them, kneeling down at Robin's head. "I can do rescue breaths if you can do chest compressions. It'll be five compressions for every breath."

Wally glanced over at her, a bit surprised at Artemis' knowledge of CPR. "Alright. Go."

Ignoring her own injury, Artemis tilted Robin's head back to check his airway. Then she pinched his nose – using her uninjured left hand – and leaned down, blowing air into his mouth, causing his chest to rise. Wally placed the heel of one hand on Robin's sternum while covering that hand with his other hand, locking his elbows before pushing down solidly at a measured pace.

"One-one thousand; two-one thousand; three-one thousand," he counted aloud in order to keep himself steady. As he reached the fifth compression, Artemis leaned down to administer another rescue breath.

"Work on getting the key out of that thing," Kaldur said tensely as he handed the abandoned disabled bomb back to M'Gann. No matter how this turned out, they would need to get out of this room.

The room grew quiet, the only sounds Wally's counting followed by Artemis' deep breaths before exhaling into her rescue breath. After several rounds of this, Kaldur glanced back at Superboy, who was staring down at the scene with a glazed expression.

"Listen for his heartbeat," Kaldur instructed.

"What have I done..." Conner murmured, as if he hadn't heard Kaldur speak. His eyes were glued to Robin's face. "I... I _killed_ him... " The words seemed to burn his throat as he choked them out.

"You did not know about the final failsafe," Kaldur snapped. They didn't have time for any of them to freeze up. They had precious few minutes before Robin started losing brain function. "None of us knew."

"But Artemis..." Conner started.

"Do not think about that now," Kaldur commanded. "He is not gone for good yet. Help us bring him back, listen for his heartbeat. "

Conner took a deep breath, doing his best to focus despite the lump of guilt in his throat that threatened to strangle him. He had to do something, _anything_ , to fix what he had done. He blocked out any other noise in the room and focused on the silence that came from their fallen teammate.

"I hear it!" Conner finally exclaimed, hearing the faint thump accompanied by the swish of blood beginning to move in Robin's veins.

"Kaldur, electricity should enter here," Wally pointed at Robin's right collar bone, "and exit here," he pointed at Robin's lower left side. "Use a low voltage and a short burst."

"Everyone stay clear," Kaldur said as he put one hand at each spot Wally had indicated. A bolt of electricity shot up his arm and into Robin and then was absorbed up into his other arm. Robin's body jerked up before falling limp once again. "Superboy?"

Conner shook his head silently as Robin's body became still once again. He felt the guilt working its way into his brain again, threatening to overwhelm him and shut him down, but he fought against it. This couldn't be it; this couldn't be the end.

"Start CPR again," Wally ordered, his eyes trained on his friend with an intensity that no one had ever seen from him before.

Without question, Artemis tilted Robin's chin up again and checked his airway. Then she leaned down and breathed into her young teammate again. Wally immediately began his compressions as soon as she had administered the rescue breath, counting out loud in order to help himself stay on pace. The two fell into rhythm as they desperately tried to bring Robin back from the dead.

Several minutes passed and Conner still couldn't hear a heartbeat.

"I… I don't hear anything…" Conner murmured, backing up as a look of shock overtook his features. They had to be approaching their six-minute deadline by now.

Kaldur glared over his shoulder at him. "He is going to make it!" he declared.

"There!" Conner gasped before Kaldur had even finished speaking, finally hearing the dull pump of Robin's heart.

"Move!" Kaldur commanded, reaching forward so quickly that Artemis and Wally had to scramble away in order to avoid getting an electric shock.

He sent another jolt through the young hero, this one a bit stronger than the first, causing his body to jerk upwards once more. The entire team seemed to forget to breathe as they watched with wide eyes, searching desperately for some sign of life.

Suddenly, Robin was coughing and gasping desperately for breath, as if he had just surfaced from underwater. The relief in the room was palpable with several audible sighs releasing all the pent up tension from the young heroes. Kaldur fell back on his heels, feeling like he might pass out with the amount of relief that he felt.

Slowly, Robin's eyes opened briefly before sliding shut again. "W-wha' happen…?" he wheezed weakly.

"Oh, you know, just you scaring the crap out of us," Artemis laughed with nervous energy as she hastily wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.

A smirk graced Robin's lips as he gave a noise like a breathless laugh. His eyes opened again as he gazed around at them blearily. "S'rry... missed that."

"Wally?" Artemis said softly as she looked over at the speedster critically, noticing that he was suddenly trembling quite severely.

"Just… just give me a minute," Wally stammered and suddenly he was on his feet and backing up away from the scene.

Despite how Wally had taken control of the situation, it seemed that even he had a breaking point. And watching his best friend die and then desperately trying to bring him back from the dead was it. Now that the danger had passed, it seemed that he was finally processing what just happened. He backed up against the wall and took several unsteady breaths, sounding like he was on the verge of hyperventilating.

"We need to get out of here," Kaldur said, glancing around at his team. "Robin still needs medical attention."

"Who, me?" Robin wheezed, his eyes blinking sleepily. "'M fine. 'M just gonna rest... my eyes jus' for a... a minute."

"No, no, no," Wally said quickly, looking over at him from where he stood, still trembling. "He's gotta stay awake, someone keep him awake."

"You gotta keep your eyes open, Robin," Artemis said, tapping the young hero firmly on the cheek. But she kept on glancing over at Wally, concern in her features at his clearly deteriorating state. But quickly she focused back on Robin as his eyes began to slide shut again. She tapped his cheek a little harder in an attempt to keep him awake. "After all that, you better stay with us, okay? Keep your eyes open."

"Have you found the key yet?" Kaldur asked tensely, turning to M'Gann, who was working on the now inactive bomb.

"No, I can't find anything that looks like a key," M'Gann answered, sounding distressed.

Artemis leaned over to look at the mess of wires that M'Gann was trying to work through. "It's not your fault," she commented. "It's like a R2D2 threw up in there."

"It might not be a key in the traditional sense," Kaldur pointed out. "Are there any markings in the panel where the door was?" His eyes went back and forth between Conner and Wally, the two who seemed to be in the most shock with the situation. Finally, he rested his gaze on Conner, the one who seemed to be dealing with it the best at the moment. Which wasn't really saying much. "Superboy, go check." Conner looked at him with a slightly vacant expression. "Superboy!"

That seemed to wake him out of his fog. He turned and went over to where the door had been, running his hands over it as he looked for anything out of the ordinary.

"There's an indentation," he said after a moment. "It's shallow, maybe a quarter of an inch deep and maybe three or four inches wide. It's in the shape of an octagon."

"Hang on," M'Gann said, searching more determinedly now that she knew what she was looking for. "Got it!"

"Miss Martian, you take the key," Kaldur said, immediately taking his team leader role as he quickly analyzed what needed to be done in order to get them out of there. "Artemis, do you have your backup crossbow?"

"Never leave home without it," Artemis said, pulling the small weapon from where it was stashed in her quiver with her good hand.

"Good, you can help Kid Flash with Robin, but keep your crossbow ready," Kaldur said. "I will not be surprised if we run into trouble out there when the people who took him realize there was no detonation. If we run into any resistance, our priority is getting past them and outside where we can get to the Bioship. Our goal is escape, not combat." He paused, looking over to where Wally still stood, unmoving. "Kid?"

"Yeah, yeah," Wally said, sucking in an unsteady breath. He was shaking less as he walked forward, but there was still a haunted look in his eyes.

"Ready?" M'Gann asked, poised at the door with the key in hand.

Robin let out a weak groan as Wally and Artemis hoisted him up between them. More blood trickled down his chest from where the tubes of the bomb had pierced his flesh.

"Ready," Kaldur confirmed after scanning the room and taking stock of each of his teammates.

"You okay over there, Baywatch?" Artemis asked quietly, glancing over at Wally who still appeared shaken by the whole ordeal. She blinked and wished she had a free hand to wipe at her eyes again, also starting to notice a dull ache just behind her eyes like a migraine.

Wally's eyes strayed to Robin, who was still struggling for consciousness. His best friend was clearly not out of the woods yet.

"I will be," Wally answered softly. "Let's just get him outta here."

"Sounds like a plan," Artemis agreed as she adjusted her hold on Robin to be more secure, despite the pain radiating from her burned hand. "Let's do this."

* * *

 **Author's Note:** Credit where credit is due. Inspiration for the machine that Robin was held in that had the bomb connected to his heart was taken from the graphic novel Forever Evil. (A fantastic read for anyone who has not yet read it)

Also, for those interested in the medical aspect of this, in the previous version of this story, the way that they got Robin out of the machine was Superboy suffocated Robin by covering his nose and mouth in order to stop his heart and then Kaldur used his electricity to shock him like a defibrillator. Well, after a chat with Alexandria-likethecityinEgypt, it turns out that wouldn't actually work because the three minutes it would take to suffocate him would take away from their four to six minutes they would have to resuscitate him. And the defibrillator alone wouldn't work, the heart needs to be fibrillating (or moving) in order for that to be effective so CPR would need to be done first. Now you've learned something just like I have! Again, thanks to Alexandria-likethecityinEgypt for helping work all that out!

Anyway, please review and let me know what you think!


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note:** Hello everybody! So sorry this chapter took so long, it's been a crazy couple weeks (fun personal fact: I just adopted a new puppy and named him Grayson, he's adorable but has been a big distraction with all his puppy antics haha), and I ended up putting much more into this chapter than I had originally anticipated. So originally this story was only going to be three chapters, but now it looks like it's going to be four because I couldn't wrap this up without this chapter getting insanely long. So hopefully that's good news for you guys since this story isn't quite over yet!

Big shout out to batastrophe for the epic nerd conversations via messaging as well as help with hashing out Conner's characterization for this chapter. You are awesome and hopefully I do him justice in this chapter! Also shout outs to those who took the time to review the last chapter: Goingdownwithmyshipz, TheBlondeBullet, Guest, Tai-ke-ai, Alexandria-likethecityinEgypt, HetaliaIShipIt, Megs, ARL15, rosiehall2000, and your. I'm so glad you guys are liking the story! Hopefully this chapter does not disappoint!

* * *

 **Chapter Three**

M'Gann placed the key into the indentation. Immediately, it began to glow. Just a moment later, the panel slid back up into the ceiling with a _swoosh,_ revealing the doorway once more.

The team moved immediately, falling naturally into a formation with Conner and Kaldur at the front and M'Gann at the back, protecting their injured teammate between them. It was clear that Robin was growing weaker by the minute and he was not yet out of the woods as he barely clung to consciousness.

It was quiet as they moved down the hallway; the only noise the team's careful footsteps and Robin's increasingly labored breathing. For a few minutes, it seemed that Kaldur was just being overly cautious.

But then they came out into the big open room they had started in and all hell broke loose.

There was a loud crash and shards of glass were suddenly raining down on top of them. They barely had time to register this when half a dozen very large figures followed the glass, falling from the ceiling and landing on their feet, shaking the entire building with their landings. They were mutated in the same way that the security at Lexcorp had been. Some had tentacles instead of arms, some had guns infused into their hands. They were all hulking forms with bulging muscles, twice the size of a normal man, though it was obvious they were human at some point. They all looked deadly and they completely surrounded the team.

Clearly, someone didn't want them getting out of here alive.

But what seemed to go unrecognized by their enemy was that they had inadvertently given the team an escape route. They weren't looking for a fight; they were only looking to get out of there.

 _M'Gann, can you call the Bioship?_ Kaldur demanded in the tense standoff.

 _Already done,_ M'Gann confirmed. _She'll be here in one minute._

 _Artemis, Wally and Robin are priority one,_ Kaldur instructed. _The rest of us will cover and follow once they are secure._

 _Got it,_ M'Gann confirmed.

The enhanced humans leapt forward at that moment and Kaldur and Conner sprang into action, meeting their enemy in midair with an earth shaking collision. M'Gann sent out an aggressive wave of her power behind her, knocking away three of the creatures that were charging them from behind. As the battle raged around them with Conner and Kaldur holding off as many of the creatures as they could and Artemis firing her crossbow to keep several more at bay, M'Gann levitated Wally, Artemis and Robin up out of harm's way.

"M'Gann, look out!" Conner yelled as several of the creatures came up behind her.

Conner leapt at the creatures that were charging the Martian, tackling them out of the way. Then he stayed close to her as protection as she concentrated on levitating their teammates up out of the now empty skylights and up into the Bioship, which had just arrived.

 _He's lost consciousness and I can't get him to wake up,_ Wally reported, sounding frantic. _We need to go. Now._

M'Gann lifted herself up into the air while Conner and Kaldur kept the enemy at bay. Bullets flew toward her, but she was able to deflect them. After she entered the Bioship, she levitated Kaldur and Conner right out of the middle of the battle. The team had never run from a fight like this before. But they all knew that this was the right thing to do. Pride was far from their minds as their worry for their teammate grew.

"M'Gann, contact Mount Justice," Kaldur said tersely as the Bioship immediately took off as soon as the hatch closed "Let Red Tornado know that Robin will need immediate medical attention when we arrive."

M'Gann nodded as she activated her communicator.

Instead of going to his seat, Kaldur walked up to the front of the Bioship where Artemis and Wally had Robin on the floor, propped up in a sitting position against one of the walls.

"We were trying to keep him upright in order to keep him conscious," Artemis told him quietly as he approached. She was sitting next to Robin, holding him up in a sitting position with her good hand. "It didn't work. He won't wake up."

"How are his vitals?" Kaldur asked, eyeing Wally.

Wally had two fingers on Robin's neck already. "His pulse is weak," he said flatly. "There may be damage to his heart muscle, it's been steadily slowing down over the past couple minutes. He's breathing, but it's shallow, meaning he's not getting a lot of oxygen." He kept his hand where it was but looked up at Kaldur with a hollow expression. "He's fading fast."

"M'Gann, how far out are we from Mount Justice?" Kaldur asked without turning around.

"At top speeds it's still going to take us at least ten more minutes," M'Gann said even as she pushed the Bioship faster.

"He needs oxygen," Wally said tersely. He looked around wildly. "Someone get the oxygen!"

"Wally, freaking out over everyone isn't going to help him!" Artemis snapped.

"Here," Conner said, his voice strangely subdued as he approached with the oxygen tank he had dug out of the medical storage that they kept on the Bioship.

"Let us lay him down flat," Kaldur said.

He reached forward and helped Artemis shift Robin so that he was lying on the floor of the Bioship. Conner set down the oxygen tank next to him and handed Kaldur the mask that was attached to it. Kaldur carefully put it over Robin's nose and mouth.

"Hang on, Robin," Kaldur said quietly, a hint of pleading in his voice. "We are almost there."

The Bioship made it back to Mount Justice in record time. As soon as they landed and opened the hatch, Black Canary and Green Arrow were hurrying into the Bioship with a stretcher. Without any preliminaries, Kaldur and Artemis hoisted Robin's limp body up onto the stretcher. Then he was rushed out of the Bioship and out of sight.

The team was much slower to exit the ship, each one seeming as if they were in a daze. They had had missions that had gone south before, but never had one of them been this gravely injured during one of their missions.

"Ah!" Artemis gasped as she descended the ramp into the cave and came out into the bright florescent light, lifting her left hand to shield her eyes from the light as she stopped in her tracks.

"Artemis?" M'Gann said with concern, coming up behind her.

"The light," Artemis mumbled, peeking out from under her hand before wincing and retreating a step back toward the inside of the Bioship. "Ugh, it's too bright!"

Kaldur looked up at the lights overhead before looking back at Artemis. "The lights are not any brighter than usual," he pointed out slowly.

"I think… I think something happened when that electricity threw me across the room," Artemis said, squeezing her eyes shut.

"You were really close when the flash went off," M'Gann said slowly. She reached out, carefully supporting Artemis. "Wally, do you think that maybe…" Her thought trailed off as she looked around and realized that Wally was no longer among them. "Oh."

Kaldur sighed. "Black Canary and the others will be… busy with Robin," he said carefully, his voice hollow as he did his best not to acknowledge what that statement really meant; that Robin was still fighting for his life. "We can treat your burned hand for now and have someone assess any damage to your eyes later."

"C'mon," M'Gann said gently as she led Artemis down the ramp. "We've got some first aid supplies in the kitchen."

Kaldur watched as M'Gann led Artemis away, knowing that she would be able to handle treating Artemis' burn. Then he turned his attention to Conner, who had silently been watching the scene. To the untrained eye, there were no emotions detectable in his features. But, over the past couple months Kaldur had learned to read the tension in his jaw and the storm that raged behind his eyes.

"How are you holding up?" Kaldur asked the clone carefully, weary of the kind of reaction he was going to get.

Conner glared at him. "This is _my_ fault," he said coldly. "If it wasn't for me, Artemis wouldn't have gotten hurt, Robin wouldn't have…" His voice cracked and then trailed off as if completing that thought was just too painful. Then he let out a groan of frustration as he stormed off.

Kaldur watched him go, feeling the weight of the world pushing down on his shoulders.

"Perhaps a better leader would have been able to prevent Robin from getting captured in the first place," Kaldur informed the empty hanger dully.

Kaldur knew that M'Gann would care for Artemis. And he knew that there would be no talking to Conner until he had a chance to cool down a bit. That left one teammate unaccounted for. And Kaldur knew exactly where he would find him.

His footsteps echoed back to him as he made his way through the deserted hallways. It didn't take long at all until he found himself in the hall with the mountain's medical bay. He saw immediately that all the shades had been pulled so that no one could see into the room. He paused, looking at the blocked windows and wondering what was going on beyond.

Then he turned his attention to the loan figure that was sitting on the floor of the hallway directly across from the med bay. Wally was sitting with his knees up and his head bowed, his hands resting on the back of his head. As Kaldur approached and then sat down beside him on the floor, he made no indication that he even knew he was there. The two sat in silence, keeping a quiet vigil for not only their teammate but also for their friend and brother.

Kaldur hadn't been sitting there long when a noise from the other end of the hallway caught his attention. He looked to see Batman sweeping down the hallway, the lines on his face set in hard angles, looking more dangerous than Kaldur had ever seen him. He half expected Batman to stop and yell at him, demand him to explain why his partner was currently in such serious condition. But Batman didn't spare the two boys sitting on the floor even a passing glance before he opened the door to the med bay and disappeared inside. It was only after the fact that Kaldur realized that Batman had had a woman in tow, someone who Kaldur had never seen before. And then the door closed and both figures were gone.

"You know, only about twenty percent of patients that need to be resuscitated outside of a hospital make a full recovery," Wally suddenly spoke up flatly. Kaldur looked over at him to find that he had raised his head and was now starting at the door that Batman had just disappeared through. "Although in some studies the number has been as low as two percent. I really wish I didn't know those statistics." He sighed heavily as he ran his hands over his face and Kaldur noticed that his hands were still shaking though the rest of him had gone still. "We bought him time… but everything we did still might not have been enough."

"Robin is a fighter," Kaldur reminded him.

Wally snorted at that. "It doesn't matter how many bad guys Robin can take out on his own," he said dryly. "If his heart stops and they can't get it going again, that's it, game over. It's simple biology."

"In there is better than any hospital facility on the planet," Kaldur insisted, gesturing at the med bay in front of them. "They will not let him slip away."

Wally nodded slightly but looked far from convinced. "We started this team," he went on. "You, me and him. We were… we were supposed to be able to handle ourselves." He took a deep breath. "Robin was the first sidekick. He's always been there, you know? He's as good as a brother to me. If he doesn't make it…" He shook his head. "I dunno what I'm gonna do…"

Kaldur was silent, having nothing to say to that. He felt the same way. Robin had set the precedent for young heroes when he had first donned his cape and mask and took to the streets of Gotham City at the age of nine. He had brought about the idea for this team when he had suggested the three of them go check out the Cadmus headquarters. Without Robin, none of them would be where they were right now. Would it really be possible to continue the team without him?

Neither of them spoke. There were no words left to say, really. All they could do was sit there and wonder how this day would turn out.

It was almost an hour later before there was any change. The door to the med bay opened and Black Canary came out, quickly closing the door behind her so that the two young heroes couldn't see what was going on inside. She looked down at the two, not at all looking surprised to see them there.

"How are you guys holding up?" she asked them sympathetically.

As Kaldur looked up at her from the floor, he realized that he felt like a child in that position. He took a deep breath before he pushed himself up, using the wall to help keep him steady; so that he could stand tall with his shoulders squared as he answered the question.

"We are enduring," he said simply, but there was still tension in his tone. "What of Robin?"

Black Canary gave him a sad smile. "He is enduring as well," she told him. "It'll be a while before we know anything more than that." She glanced around. "Where is everyone else?"

"M'Gann was helping Artemis," Kaldur told her. "She burned her hand during the rescue. They were going to use first aid supplies in the kitchen. She could still use further medical aid though, she was complaining about sensitivity to the light when we arrived."

"She was?" Wally said, sounding as if he were emerging from a fog. He blinked up at Kaldur from where he sat on the floor, though oddly it didn't seem like he was looking right at him but rather passed him. Kaldur only nodded in confirmation. "She might have burned corneas from the flash that went off."

"I'll go take a look," Black Canary said. "What about Conner?"

Kaldur sighed. "I do not know where he went." He paused. "He feels… responsible for what happened to Robin."

"How exactly did this happen?" Black Canary asked slowly. "I don't think we ever got all of the details when M'Gann contacted us."

The last thing Kaldur wanted to do was relive the events of that night. But that was his job as leader, so he calmly relayed the events of that evening to Black Canary, leaving nothing out. Black Canary made no comments, only listening intently as Kaldur spoke.

"It was not an easy situation to be in," Black Canary told him once he had finished. "For what it's worth, I think you guys did the right thing. You brought your entire team back here alive, Kaldur. That's significant." Kaldur nodded, but didn't feel much better. He couldn't help but wonder if Batman would feel the same way, or if he would see a way that they could have spared Robin from this life threatening situation. "It's getting late. You guys should go get some rest."

"Pass," Wally said dully as he returned his gaze to the door to the medical bay.

Black Canary nodded, not looking surprised by this reaction. "I'm going to go check on Artemis and M'Gann. Come get me if you guys need anything." And with one more sympathetic look at the two, she turned and headed down the hallway.

Kaldur rubbed his eyes. Exhaustion was starting to catch up with him, not to mention he was feeling a rather nasty headache coming on. But somehow the thought of sitting down and staring at that door for another couple hours didn't appeal to him. He wasn't sure how Wally of all people could be so still. He briefly thought of Black Canary's suggestion to get some rest, but he knew full well that was going to be impossible until they knew if Robin was going to be okay. He needed a distraction, something else to focus on for a while or he felt like he might lose his mind.

"I am going to look for Conner," Kaldur said. "Would you like to come with me?"

"No," Wally said without looking away from the door.

Kaldur sighed. "Sitting here and staring at the door is not going to help Robin," he reminded him. He cocked his head, trying to get a better look at the speedster as something was dawning on him. "When was the last time you had something to eat?"

"I've got my stash," Wally said, motioning to the emergency snacks he kept in a compartment on his wrist.

"You need to eat something more substantial than that," Kaldur insisted, now able to see the hazy look in Wally's eye that he knew meant the speedster was running dangerously low on fuel.

Kaldur found that it was comforting to have a problem that he knew how to solve and a teammate that he could actually help right now. It took several more minutes of convincing, but Kaldur finally convinced Wally to get up off the floor and head with him down the hallway toward the kitchen. Wally stumbled several times in his daze, and although he was able to catch himself, Kaldur put his hand out behind him, hovering behind his back just in case he completely lost his footing.

Checking on Conner would have to wait.

They entered the kitchen area and Kaldur immediately noticed that the lights had been dimmed. He glanced around and spotted Artemis sitting on the couch in the lounge area, M'gann sitting next to her and Black Canary kneeling in front of her as she examined her eyes.

After checking to make sure that Wally still seemed steady as he headed for the kitchen, Kaldur turned and joined the others. He could see that Artemis' injured hand was already bandaged.

"How do you feel, Artemis?" Kaldur inquired.

Artemis sighed loudly as she shifted restlessly in her seat. "Well, now that I don't feel like my eyes are gonna burn out of their sockets, a little better."

"As far as I can tell, there shouldn't be any permanent damage," Black Canary said. "Like Wally said, it looks like burned corneas. You'll be very sensitive to light for a while, but it will heal on it's own."

"Great," Artemis mumbled, annoyed. She glanced up at Kaldur before looking back at Black Canary. "How's Robin doing? Is he gonna be okay?"

"He's hanging in there," Black Canary said noncommittally, though she made an obvious effort to keep her tone light.

"The only reason it would be taking this long is if there were complications," Wally said flatly as he walked over to them. He had a bag of pretzels in one hand and was half-heartedly picking at them with much less enthusiasm than he normally would. "He was fading fast when we got here. If they weren't able to stabilize him by now… that means something's really wrong." He looked over at Black Canary with a dull yet annoyed expression. "We're not stupid."

Black Canary sighed. "I know you're not," she assured them. She stood up and crossed her arms over her chest, surveying the team around her seriously before she went on. "This is what I know. The burns on his wrist and ankles are very severe and need to be monitored closely for infection and may need skin grafts in the future in order to heal. He has internal bleeding, though we don't know if it's because of him getting roughed up when he was grabbed or from the trauma of the electric shock. There was also concern about a concussion and perhaps damage to his heart. A lesser concern was also mentioned about some fractured or possibly broken ribs."

"Shit…" Artemis breathed, her eyes wide.

"It's a daunting list of concerns," Black Canary allowed, glancing around at the team who all looked very grim. "But believe it or not, Robin has come back from worse in the past. There's no getting around the fact that his body has been through a terrible trauma tonight. But he is young and healthy and a fighter. I really believe that he will pull through."

"His body has been through a terrible trauma?" came a voice from the doorway followed by a sarcastic snort. "Yeah. We put him through that." They all turned to see Conner standing in the doorway, a dark look on his face.

"You likely saved his life," Black Canary countered firmly. "Especially if the internal bleeding occurred when he got captured, Robin didn't have time to waste."

"He also didn't need to get electrocuted," Conner mumbled. He looked up and his eyes focused on Artemis. "Humans... They're so fragile."

"Hey, who are you calling fragile," Artemis snapped, glaring daggers in the general direction of the clone. She couldn't quite look right at him because of the light coming in from the hallway behind him.

"We were the same distance from that machine when it went off," Conner pointed out. He held out his hands. "I didn't even get burned. You humans, you get hurt so easily."

Suddenly, Artemis was on her feet, cutting off anything else Conner might have said. "We get it, you're practically invincible," she growled. "That doesn't make the rest of us freaking helpless."

"I don't think that's what he meant," M'Gann said imploringly.

But Conner didn't seem to hear her as he was still glaring darkly at Artemis. "Had it been me instead of Robin, the electricity barely would have winded me."

"Had it been you instead of Robin in that thing, it wouldn't have been an issue because _Robin_ would have seen the final failsafe and prevented it!" Artemis shot back. Conner's eyes widened and he took a step back as if she had slapped him. Artemis held up her bandaged hand. "We humans may burn easier than Kryptonians, but at least we use our heads!"

"Artemis," M'Gann said in surprise, looking at the scene with anxiety in her eyes.

"No, you know how many times Robin has saved _his_ butt?" Artemis demanded. "He doesn't get to stand there and pretend that because this one time Robin needed us to save him, suddenly he is some _fragile human_. This has nothing to do with him being human and everything to do with us failing him when he needed us."

"You didn't fail him," Black Canary tried.

"Well it certainly doesn't feel like a rousing success!" Artemis practically shouted. She winced and rubbed at her eyes.

"Artemis, you need to take it easy," Kaldur said carefully, stepping forward.

Artemis snorted but the anger was clearly draining out of her. "I'm gonna go lie down." She looked over at Wally, who had been silent through the exchange, her gaze softening. "Come get me if there's any news."

Wally nodded solemnly as he met her gaze. Then Artemis turned and made her way out of the room and toward the dormitories. M'Gann quickly stood.

"I'll make sure she makes it okay," she said hurriedly as she followed.

As they left, there was a ringing silence in their wake.

"She didn't mean it," Black Canary said, looking at Conner, who appeared frozen in the doorway in shock. Then she glanced around at the three boys still left in the room. "It's been a trying night for all of you. Don't be too hard on yourselves." There was an awkward silence following the statement as none of the boys seemed to have it in them to respond to that. Black Canary sighed. "I'm going to go check on Robin's progress. I'll update you when I can." And with that she headed back toward the med bay.

There was silence in the room for a good long while, Kaldur, Wally and Conner seeming rooted to their respective spots around the room.

"The weight of guilt does not fall solely on your shoulders, Conner," Kaldur finally spoke up, looking over at the clone. He knew that Artemis had taken Conner's statements the wrong way, blinded by her anger. Being fragile had nothing to do with being weak. "As a team, we should have been able to prevent this and protect our own."

"If I had just waited," Conner mumbled to himself. "If I had just waited even just ten more seconds…" He let out a frustrated sigh as he rubbed his hands over his face.

"We cannot be dragged backwards by the 'what ifs,'" Kaldur said, even though deep down he wanted to dwell on the 'what ifs' himself. "All we can do is deal with the situation at hand and move forward."

"If he doesn't make it, do you really think any of us are going to just deal with it and move on?" Conner demanded lowly, glaring at the Atlantean.

It was like all the air was forcibly sucked out of the room.

After a minute Kaldur sighed as he sank heavily onto the couch. "No," he admitted quietly. "I do not."

Losing Robin would break them. They all knew that even if none of them were willing to admit quite in that way. The team hadn't even been together for an entire year yet. If this failure proved to be the end of the first ever sidekick, none of them would ever be the same.

Kaldur knew that Conner was right in a way. Humans were indeed fragile creatures. Their skin was not as thick as his Atlantean skin. They could not move as fast as a speedster. They did not had the strength or invulnerably of a Kryptonian. They had none of the telepathic powers of a Martian. But even given all of that, Robin as well as Artemis never had an issue with keeping up with the team. They were both invaluable to this team, their shortcomings as human always forgotten during missions.

Even if Robin was only human, Kaldur knew from experience to expect extraordinary things from him. He took a deep breath, trying to calm his nerves.

If anyone could survive this… it was Robin.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Note:** Hello readers! I'm still here! So sorry this took so incredibly long. I don't have any real good excuses, just good old fashioned distraction by other muses. But hopefully this was worth the wait!

Special shout outs to those who took the time to review the last chapter! Sairey13, Goingdownwithmyshipz, Alexandria-likethecityinEgypt, batastrophe and Tai-ke-ai. I really appreciate it!

And finally, without further ado, the conclusion of Sacrifice!

* * *

 **Chapter Four**

It felt as if there were a weight on top of him, threatening to crush him.

If he wasn't so tired, Dick probably would have been panicking. Something was clearly very wrong, but he couldn't for the life of him remember what it was. Something must have happened and his instincts were screaming at him to figure out what was going on, but just opening his eyes seemed like a monumental task.

Still, his survival instincts were strong, and after a minute he managed to drag his eyelids open. But immediately the blurred room began to tip to one side, causing his stomach shift uncomfortably and for a moment he thought he was going to be sick. He tried to groan as he let his eyes fall back shut after only a moment, but somehow the sound was muffled and his throat burned painfully.

Okay, that wasn't good. He _had_ to figure out what was going on.

Reaching deep within himself, he found the strength to drag his eyes open again, forcing them to stay open this time. He looked around blearily, doing his best to assess the situation through the fog that seemed to fill his head. He was fully expecting for some kind of horrific scene to come into focus. Surely he was captured and restrained by some supervillain somewhere in the bowels of Gotham.

But a sterile, white room was drifting in and out of focus, shifting in a way that shouldn't be physically possible. Despite that, the sight brought comfort even before he could really recognize why that was.

"Robin?"

Dick tried to turn his head toward the source of the soft voice, but even that small task proved to be too much for his aching muscles. He tracked his eyes to one side just as Conner entered his line of sight, looking down at him with concern. Dick tried to speak, to ask what was going on, but ended up gagging on some foreign object in his mouth.

"Hang on," Conner said quickly. "Hang on, I'll get someone to take that out." And without any further explanation he disappeared.

More voices came from beyond where Robin could see.

"What's going on?"

"Robin's awake."

Something was wrong, something was very wrong. He had the sense that he wasn't in immediate danger, but why couldn't he move, why couldn't he speak? He tried to swallow to alieved the intense dry feeling in his mouth, but something was keeping him from doing so. He felt like he wasn't getting quite enough air, but for some reason he couldn't seem to pull any more into his lungs. He felt uncomfortable, like he was going to gag but wasn't quite able to.

"Hey, take it easy, Rob." Dick's eyes were pulled toward Wally's presence, feeling a bit of comfort at seeing his best friend appear at his bedside. Wally was looking down at him anxiously. "You're on a ventilator, it's breathing for you. You need to relax and let it do its thing, okay?"

Dick wanted to tell him that was easier said than done. He was relieved to know exactly what was causing his discomfort, but it was still hard to pull himself back from the panic that had been building inside of him. As the sidekick to Gotham's vigilante, it had been drilled into Dick from a very young age that he had to control every situation he was in in order to stay alive. That was a very difficult instinct to ignore.

"Okay, guys, let's give him some room, shall we?" came a new yet familiar voice.

Dick's eyes moved to the other side of the bed in time to see Kaldur and M'Gann disappearing from the bedside while Leslie Tompkins appeared. This struck Dick as very strange. By now he realized that he was in the med bay of Mount Justice. Dr. Tompkins was a doctor from a clinic in Crime Alley in Gotham, one of the few people who knew the real identities of Batman and Robin, helping out when their medical needs became more than what Alfred could handle. What was Dr. Tompkins doing at Mount Justice?

And why wasn't Bruce here?

"Robin, I don't want you to try and talk," Dr. Tompkins said in that no nonsense way she had that made any considerations of defying her disappear. "No moving your head either. I don't want to disturb the tube in your throat. What I want you to do is blink once for yes and twice for no. Can you do that for me?"

Dick looked up at her blearily, his mind slow to comprehend what she was asking of him. The scene in front of him kept slipping in and out of focus, making him feel sick to his stomach. She seemed to wait patiently until finally after a minute he let his eyes slide shut before pulling them open again.

Dr. Tompkins smiled. "Good boy," she said much more gently. She glanced at something past his field of vision. "Your heartbeat is up higher than I'd like it to be." It was only then that Dick became aware of the beeping noise in the room. He focused on it, listening to how it sounded slightly off kilter. "Are you in any significant pain?"

Dick had to consider that for a moment. He took stock of himself even as he struggled for focus and calm. No, 'pain' wouldn't be the word that he would use if he had the luxury of being able to speak right now. He ached all over, but it wasn't anything unmanageable. That wasn't the problem. The problem was this damn tube down his throat was uncomfortable and wasn't letting him get as much oxygen as he wanted. And the longer he was awake, the harder it was to control his gag reflexes.

Slowly and with a great amount of effort, he closed his eyes and opened them. Then he closed them and opened them again. _No_.

Before she could speak again, Kaldur appeared at Dr. Tompkins' side.

"If you would like, we could have Miss Martian communicate with him telepathically," he offered, looking at the doctor.

"Yes, that would be helpful," Dr. Tompkins agreed. The look on her face said that she hadn't even realized that was an option. She wasn't used to being around Martians.

 _Robin?_

The touch of M'Gann's telepathic mind was comfortingly familiar.

 _Hey, Miss M._

Even his mental voice sounded tired and a bit distant, fading off at the end of the short statement. But now that he was able to communicate he noticed the beeping noise in the room evening out. That had to be a good sign.

 _How do you feel?_

 _I ache,_ he told her, struggling a bit to focus his thoughts. _And this tube in my throat… it's uncomfortable. I don't feel like I'm getting enough air. And it makes me wanna gag._

"He seems disoriented, like he's only just barely conscious," M'Gann reported out loud, her voice coming from somewhere beyond Dick's line of sight. "His mental voice sounds very far away. But he said he feels achy and also the tube in his throat is uncomfortable and he feels like he's not getting enough oxygen."

 _And it makes me wanna gag,_ Dick reminded her. That part was getting more uncomfortable by the minute.

"And it makes him want to gag," M'Gann added.

Dr. Tompkins had moved up the bed and was messing with something that Dick couldn't see.

"He's awake now," came another voice. Conner? "Can't you just take the tube out?"

"To be safe, I want to wean him off the ventilator slowly," Dr. Tompkins said, glancing behind her. Then she focused back on Dick. "Is that better?"

At first, Dick didn't know what she was talking about. But then he noticed that he was able to take a deeper breath than he had been able to a minute ago. He went to blink in answer, but as he closed his eye he felt darkness pulling him toward unconsciousness. He managed to open his eyes again, but his lids would only seem to go up halfway.

"I'm going to give you something to help you sleep," Dr. Tompkins said matter-of-factly. She suddenly had a syringe in her hand. "Your body has been through a lot, you need to get a lot of rest." She was injecting the contents of the syringe into a tube that led somewhere that he couldn't see. "I'll wean you off of the ventilator while you sleep. So next time you wake up, it'll be gone. Sound good?"

Dick didn't get a chance to answer. He had been hanging onto consciousness only by a thread, so with the pull of the sedatives the thread snapped almost immediately. He wasn't completely sure that his eyes even closed, but suddenly darkness swallowed him and he fell away from the mortal world.

XxXxX

"You're sure he's going to be okay?" Wally asked for at least the fifth time as they all watched Robin's eyes slide shut – the lenses in his mask having been removed so that they could see his eyes – and his muscles go slack.

"I'm sure," Dr. Thompkins patiently assured him as she fiddled with the machines the young hero was hooked up to. "His vitals have been steadily improving all night. With some rest he should be right as rain in a few weeks."

The entire team was gathered in the med bay of Mount Justice, having been camped out there for several hours, unwilling to leave Robin's side after he had finally been stabilized and they had been allowed in to see him. They had even dimmed the lights in the room so that Artemis could join them, though she was still squinting quite a bit in discomfort. They had all been drifting in and out of consciousness in chairs and other beds around the med bay as it became so late that it was early when Conner had noticed Robin waking.

The hope had been palpable in the room with signs of life from their fallen teammate, but that hope had quickly dissipated as they watched him struggle just to remain conscious. They weren't used to seeing Robin of all people struggle with anything.

After she was finished, Dr. Tompkins turned away from the bed to address the rest of the team. "He's going to be out for quite a while," she told them. "You all should think about getting some real rest yourselves. Sitting around here watching him sleep and getting sleep deprivation yourselves isn't going to help him." They were all a little taken aback by how firmly she spoke, leaving very little room to question her. It was suddenly obvious how she was able to doctor the Dark Knight himself.

"We will take turns sitting with Robin," Kaldur said after a moment, turning to address his team. He didn't want to outright defy the stern doctor, but he knew that none of them would be comfortable with leaving Robin alone.

"I already slept," Artemis spoke up. "I'll stay with him first."

"I'll stay too," Wally said. "I dozed off for a while before he woke up just now."

"I don't need sleep," Conner said simply.

Kaldur sighed. He looked over at M'Gann. "M'Gann and I will retire for a few hours. Then we will come back and relieve you."

There were vague nods of agreement that Kaldur knew was the best that he could expect. He turned and headed out of the room, M'Gann hurrying to catch up with him. They walked for a minute in silence as they headed to where their bedrooms were located on the other side of the mountain.

"He was afraid," M'Gann finally said quietly.

"What?" Kaldur said, looking over at her.

"Robin," M'Gann said, looking carefully down at her shoes. "When I entered his mind, I felt fear. And pain." She shuddered, wrapping her arms around herself. "I've never felt anything like that come from Robin."

Kaldur stopped in his tracks, though it wasn't shock that caused him to pause. It had been obvious what Robin had been feeling, his emotions readable through his eyes for once. But hearing M'Gann say it out loud like that brought the situation down on him harder. He was supposed to lead this team; he was supposed to prevent this kind of thing from happening.

M'Gann placed a gentle hand of his shoulder, looking at him apologetically, clearly sensing the effect her words had on him. "C'mon. Let's try and get some rest," she said, a sympathetic look in her eye.

Kaldur nodded. He knew getting rest wasn't going to be easy, but it was worth a try after being awake for so long.

XxXxX

"You're sure he's breathing okay on his own?" Wally asked, eyeing Robin's face, which was now finally free of the respirator. He had a bad habit of questioning everything the doctor did, but thankfully she showed an impressive amount of patience with him.

Dr. Tompkins gave Wally a comforting smile. "I'm quite sure," she assured him. "All his vitals are holding steady. See?" She indicated the screen above his bed.

Wally scanned the numbers again and again, cataloging them all. He was brought back to himself by a hand on his shoulder, looking around to see that Dr. Tompkins had come up beside him.

"I know you had quite the scare yesterday," she said gently, and Wally was surprised by her tone. He had never imagined that the doctor who treated Batman of all people to be so kind. "But he's now stable and resting comfortably. You helped to save his life, but he's past the danger zone now. So you can relax, okay? He's going to be fine."

Wally nodded, relief flooding over him completely for the first time since Robin had been taken. "Thanks."

"I'll get an alert if any of his vitals drop," she told him. She glanced around the room at where Conner and Artemis still sat. "If you guys wanted to go get some rest, I assure you he'll still be closely monitored."

Nobody moved. Dr. Tompkins didn't look surprised as she headed out of the room.

It was an odd group that was left, something that hadn't been considered when they were deciding who would stay and who would go. Wally took a seat next to Robin's bed, Artemis was sitting up on a bed on the opposite wall and Conner was standing up against a wall a few feet down from her. There was still tension between Artemis and Conner from the confrontation earlier. Not to mention the tension that was always present between Artemis and Wally, though admittedly it had lessened since they had worked together trying to resuscitate a lifeless Robin. Suffice it to say, the silence that now filled the room was an uncomfortable one.

"I didn't mean it like you thought I did," Conner suddenly blurted after the silence had gone on for a while.

"What?" Wally said, confused and unsure who he was even talking to since he was staring down at his shoes.

Conner glared – which was his default reaction to pretty much any emotion – before he looked over at where Artemis was sitting. "Earlier… when I said that humans were fragile. I didn't mean it the way you took it."

Artemis matched his glare. "And how did you mean it?" she demanded, balling up her non injured hand into a fist.

Conner looked taken aback, obviously not having expected to be asked to explain himself. After only being out of his pod for a few months, he was still not always good with putting his thoughts into words.

"I just… I mean… I _didn't_ mean…" he fumbled and then shot Wally a look that practically pleaded for help.

"It's sometimes easy to forget that you and Robin are only human in the heat of a mission," Wally spoke up. He shot a look at Conner and by the relief on his face he could guess that it was what the clone had been trying to get at. "The way that you both keep up with us, sometimes we can forget that you're vulnerable to things we aren't. Fragile does not mean that Robin is weak."

"Robin is not a weakling," Conner agreed firmly. "I thought that he might be when I first saw him, thought that being just a human is a disadvantage, but I know now that it's not. It's not for him and it's not for you either."

Artemis looked him up and down for a moment. "You're right, fragile does not mean weak," she allowed slowly, still glaring, though there was a bit less bite to the look. "What it does mean is that we have to be that much stronger." She paused and then went on stiffly. "But I'll take that as an apology."

Conner gave one, curt nod, the closest he would get to expressing gratitude.

They lapsed into silence once more, though this time it was at least slightly less uncomfortable now that there was a better understanding between the three.

As time passed, despite their assurances that they weren't tired, both Wally and Artemis kept dozing off in their seats. Conner was the only one who refused to rest, standing next to Robin's hospital bed like a sentry.

It was about an hour later when Dr. Tompkins came to finish weaning Robin off of the ventilator. It was a relief when he was finally free of the machine, but the doctor informed them that it could still be a while before he woke up. Again, she encouraged the three to get some rest themselves, but none of them even considered the offer. They wouldn't feel better until they saw more proof that Robin was really going to be okay.

"Gin," Artemis said smugly as she laid her playing cards down on the bed in front of her. Out of boredom, Wally had fetched the cards about an hour before in order to help them pass the time. They hadn't been able to convince Conner to play, but despite that he had wandered over to their side of the room in order to watch the game.

"Are you _kidding_ me?" Wally demanded with exasperation, flinging his own cards down. He sat opposite her on the bed, his back to where his best friend lay. "How is that even possible? I haven't won once!"

"I knew we shoulda played for money," Artemis grumbled as she began collecting up the cards, through there was a slight smile tugging at her lips.

"Rookie mistake."

They all whipped around at the sound of the quiet, hoarse voice. Robin had shifted his head and his eyes were open as he looked across the room at them with a ghost of a smile on his face.

"Robin!" Wally shouted as suddenly he was across the room and at his best friend's bedside. "How are you feeling?"

"Water?" Robin rasped, blinking blearily up at them as Artemis and Conner also gathered around his bed.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, hold on," Wally said, rushing away, happy for a task to accomplish. He race through the mountain, arrived in the kitchen, checked several cabinets to find a glass, filled the glass with water and ran back to the med bay within the span of a minute. But when he arrived back, the smile on his face fell as he saw Artemis helping Robin sip from a cup of water through a straw. "Hey, where did that come from?"

Artemis glanced at him and rolled her eyes. "There was a glass next to the pitcher of water on his bedside table, genius," she said, the last word coming out coated in sarcasm.

Robin coughed a laugh as he leaned back. "Over achiever."

Wally huffed an exaggerated sigh as he set the glass on the table next to the pitcher of water.

"How are you feeling?" he asked, taking a seat next to Artemis.

"Like I had a brush with death," Robin wheezed, though a slight smile was still playing at his lips.

"Don't be so dramatic," Artemis quipped, a smile tugging at her lips. "You were _barely_ dead."

Robin laughed lightly at that, wincing slightly as the laugh turned into a cough. "Water please?"

"So polite," Artemis teased as she held out the cup again, helping him lift his head with her other hand. After a few sips, she pulled the cup away. "The doctor said you can only have a little at a time," she explained, recalling what Dr. Tompkins had told them earlier.

"Dr. Tompkins?" Robin asked.

"Yeah, Batman brought her in to help when…" Wally started to explain, his thought trailing off. He took a deep breath. "When they figured out how serious your condition was."

"What exactly happened?" Robin asked, looking between the three of them. "I remember you guys disabled the bomb. Then… not much of anything."

Artemis and Wally both looked uncomfortable, shooting unsure glances over at Conner, who had been silent so far. But Conner's features gave nothing away.

"Well…" Wally started out slowly. "We did disable the bomb. But I guess there was some sort of failsafe that was built into the machine that you were trapped in. When the shackles were broken it set off an electric charge that… that stopped your heart."

Robin raised his eyebrows in mild surprise at that. "Huh," he said.

"Huh?" Conner repeated angrily. "That's it?"

"I'm a little tired for clever quips," Robin said with a small smile. "I'll think of one later."

"It was my fault," Conner suddenly blurted.

Robin looked up at him, clearly confused. "What?"

"It was my fault the failsafe got triggered," Conner said, the words spilling out of him in a wave as he stared down at his shoes. "Artemis saw it, but I was already breaking the shackles and it went off. I… I coulda killed you because I rushed in without thinking it through." He ran a hand through his hair and then with a great effort he looked over and met Robin's eyes. "I'm sorry."

Robin casually shrugged one shoulder. "Don't worry about it. It was an honest mistake."

Conner stared at him in shock for a moment, his mouth agape. "An honest mistake?" he repeated in disbelief. "It was an _honest mistake_ that flat lined you for a good five minutes. You could have died. I mean, technically you did die, but you could have _stayed_ dead."

"But I didn't," Robin pointed out. "And I bet you all got some real hands on training with how CPR works, huh?" He glanced over at Wally, his eyes sparking in amusement.

"How can you be so… calm?" Conner asked, clearly at a loss.

"SB, did you forget what I do?" Robin said with a snort. "I spend my nights jumping off of skyscrapers in Gotham City. One wrong move and I fall and die. And that's on a slow night when I'm not battling superhuman villains. Every night is a near death experience. If I got worked up every time, I'd never get anything done." He chuckled lightly to himself.

"Get traught or get dead, right?" Artemis spoke up with a smile.

Robin coughed a laugh as his eyelids sagged. "Exactly."

"Doc said you still need a lot of rest after what your body went through," Wally spoke up, noticing that Robin suddenly seemed like he was struggling to stay awake. All this was clearly taking a lot out of him.

"She might be on to something," Robin mumbled as he blinked slowly.

"Get some sleep, Boy Wonder," Artemis said with a surprising amount of gentleness.

He didn't need any more encouragement than that as he immediately drifted off once again, looking somehow much more peaceful and natural than he had before.

"I can't believe he wasn't mad at me," Conner said in disbelief, shaking his head.

"You gotta remember that even though Rob is the youngest among us, he's been a sidekick for the longest," Wally said. "He was the first. If anyone's gonna understand that you make mistakes when you're first starting out in this underaged hero business, it's gonna be him."

Conner nodded. "I guess you're right."

"I'm always right," Wally said with a cheeky grin.

"Now that's a dangerous path to travel down," Artemis laughed.

As Artemis and Wally dissolved into some playful banter, Conner studied Robin's small form. He resolved right then and there that he would never endanger his teammates again. He would work harder at thinking before he acted. He knew that Robin certainly didn't need protecting, but they were still a team and needed to have each other's backs.

For his teammates' sakes, he would be better. They deserved better.

XxXxX

 _Recognized Batman 02._

Kaldur had been passing by the Zeta tubes on his way back to the med bay to see Robin. He had retired to his bedroom in the mountain several hours ago, but hadn't been able to get much rest. He paused when the Dark Knight came sweeping into the room.

 _Recognized Green Arrow 08._

"How's he doing?" Surprisingly the question didn't come from Batman, but rather from Green Arrow.

"I have not been in to see him since Dr. Tompkins started weaning him off of the ventilator," Kaldur said, addressing Green Arrow, but glancing over at Batman unsurely. He had pulled up one of the holographic computers and was typing away, not seeming to pay too much attention to the young hero. Kaldur found this to be odd. "I was just on my way to check in with him. Wally, Artemis and Conner have been sitting with him. I am sure they would have alerted me if anything went wrong."

Green Arrow nodded. "Kid's tough. He's going to be fine."

"I agree," Kaldur said. There was a minute of awkward silence. "Will you be going in to see him?" he asked carefully, looking at Batman.

Batman paused and glanced at him, his features giving away about as much as brick wall. Then he turned back to the holographic computer.

"No," he said simply.

Kaldur started at that. He had simply assumed that's why Batman was here.

"No?" Kaldur repeated incredulously. He glanced at Green Arrow who simply shrugged helplessly. "You have not been in to see him since he was first brought in."

Batman didn't break keystroke. "He was stabilizing when I left. Dr. Tompkins has been keeping me appraised of his condition. He is no longer in a danger zone and is expected to make a full recovery."

"Yes, but do you not want to see him for yourself?" Kaldur pressed.

"I trust Dr. Tompkins' updates on his condition," Batman said simply.

Kaldur was struggling to grasp what was going on. He had not been expecting Batman to act to apathetic toward his injured partner.

"Then why are you here?" Kaldur finally asked, his tone sharp.

At that, Batman stopped typing. Even just a few months ago, Kaldur would have felt intimated as the Dark Knight's glare was fixed on him. But the Atlantean stood his ground. His leadership may have caused Robin to be kidnapped the night before, but it had also brought Robin back to the mountain alive.

"Robin managed to transfer some of the data he stole to the server here in the mountain," Batman said stiffly. "I am here to retrieve it. It is necessary as we are closing in on apprehending the people who captured him."

Kaldur stared openly at this new piece of information.

" _You_ are going after them?" he asked, taken aback.

Batman nodded curtly. "We are closing in. Superman is in route to an island where we tracked Luthor's special brand of security, which we suspect is utilizing a variation of the Kobra-Venom. We just need exact coordinates of the underground base, which I suspect Robin located when he infiltrated Luthor's files."

So that's where Batman had been all this time. Tracking down the people that had captured his partner. And although this made sense and put Kaldur more at ease about why he hadn't been at Robin's side, it also made him angry and annoyed.

"That was not your battle to fight," Kaldur asserted. The surprise in Green Arrow was apparent, but the Dark Knight didn't give anything away. "This was _our_ battle. Our team was effected and it should have been _our_ job to track them down."

"That was not your call to make," Batman said firmly.

"The mission was given to us by _you_ ," Kaldur countered. "And you should have allowed us to see it through until the very end."

Before Batman had a chance to respond, a beeping from the computer behind him drew his attention away. There were a few keystrokes, and Kaldur leaned to one side, trying to see around Batman to what was on the screen. But in a flash, the holographic computer disappeared.

"We have what we need," Batman told Green Arrow in a clipped tone. And without another word he turned and headed for the Zeta tubes.

"Don't take it personally," Green Arrow spoke up as Batman disappeared. "The Bat doesn't show affection in normal says. While some may feel comfort keeping a vigil at a bedside, Batman goes out after the one that did the hurting. It makes him feel… useful. I'm sure Robin knows that by now and isn't expecting him. It's also why he didn't let your team finish out the mission. It was something he had to do himself."

Kaldur nodded, though it didn't make him feel much better about the situation. He watched as Green Arrow followed Batman's lead into the Zeta tube, before he turned and continued on to the med bay.

He honestly wasn't sure what he had expected when he returned to the med bay. It had been such an unlikely group that had volunteered to stay with Robin, what with Wally and Artemis' general disdain for each other and Conner's general disdain for everyone when he was in a mood. But it was a pleasant surprised to see that the three seemed to have coexisted quite well while he had been gone. Artemis had nodded off on one of the other beds across the room, Wally sat contentedly on one side of Robin's bed while Conner stood on the other side, leaning up against the wall.

As Kaldur took in Robin's form, he was relieved to see that not only did he look much more peaceful without the ventilator, but some of his color was even starting to come back.

"How is he?" Kaldur asked, drawing Wally and Conner's attention.

"A lot better," Wally said. "The Doc has been in to see him several times and has said that his vitals continue to get stronger. There's going to be a lengthy recovery period, but with time she expects him to make a full recovery."

"I am glad to hear that," Kaldur said.

"He was even awake and talking to us not too long ago," Wally told him with a smile. "He's gonna be fine." The statement held more weight with the knowledge that Robin had been coherent enough to have a conversation.

"I have no doubt," Kaldur responded even as he felt the relief wash over him at the news.

He couldn't help but return Wally's smile. Just twenty-four hours ago, they were frantically searching for Robin, unsure if they would even find him alive. In the last twenty-four hours this team had dealt with more than any of them have ever had to deal with before. And all things considered, as Kaldur observed Robin's heart monitor beeping steadily, he was proud of how his team had handled it. During the most dire of circumstances they had all come together and they had all helped to save Robin's life. That was no small accomplishment.

Mistakes may have been made with this mission, but they survived with all the members of their team still intact. Even though Batman had taken away their chance at getting justice for those who had put their teammate through this, they would still see this out to the end, aiding Robin in his recovery in any way they could.

They would learn from what happened and go into their next mission all that much wiser.

 **The End**

* * *

 **Author's Note:** And there you have it, finally finished how many months later… but I hope you enjoyed it! Please let a review with your thoughts and constructive criticism of how I can do better is always welcome!

For those of you who enjoyed my writing, I want to let you know that I do have another Young Justice story in the works. It's going to be focused more on Robin and Artemis and their bond over being the only two humans on the team, kind of like what happened in the episode Homefront, but on a much larger scale. I'm hoping to have more of it done before I start posting so there won't be several months between chapters, but keep an eye out for that in the next couple weeks!


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